From the DPC’s e-mail update, inviting the public to Monday night’s meeting:

Spring is here, and with it comes wonderful news for healthy-food lovers! Here is an update on what’s going on with DPC.

We have chosen a location!

A new housing development near Delridge Way SW and Brandon, run by the DESC, will be finished around the end of 2013 – and DPC has been in negotiations to secure a commercial space on Delridge Way SW. Our plan is to open a green grocery store selling organic fruits, vegetables, greens, roots, seeds, nuts, grains, flours, oils, nut butters, bottled tomato sauce and a few similar items, bread, meat, poultry, fish, eggs, and dairy products in the beginning of 2014.

We plan for a large part of our produce purchases to come from the Delridge community itself, and so we have a great need to reach out to neighbors to find and recruit members and growers. If we connect gardeners to the food hub that we are growing, we can all eat healthy, local food without paying the high prices that we are all used to seeing for organic produce at the grocery store. USDA rules for organic food allow us to present small growers (those whose businesses gross less than $5000 per year) with rules that they sign, stating that they use no pesticides or other unhealthy farming methods. We can encourage local farming and help to revitalize Delridge’s economy by becoming a great place for neighbors to make a little extra cash.

Next steps

Over the next two years, we need to build our member base, raise money, and recruit neighbor-farmers in order to be ready to open as soon as possible once the store is built. From now until the time we open, we will host one public meeting per month, when we will invite new volunteers to come and find out what they can do to help. We need people to help schedule volunteering time, oversee fundraising and recruiting projects, knock on doors, show up to local events and distribute information, recruit new members and farmers, join the Board of Directors, and contribute their professional talents on a volunteer basis. If you like talking to people and making friends, we especially need you to do person-to-person outreach to the community.

Meeting this Monday

This Monday, April 16th 2012, is our first in this series of monthly meetings. It takes place at 6:30 pm at the Delridge Library. Come meet with us, share ideas, ask questions, and learn how you might like to get involved. From now on, we’ll be sending out monthly reminders to our email list to let everybody know what’s going on and when the next meeting is. You can also visit our website and click on the calendar to see what local events we’ll be at next.